Post-WWII photo negatives back in Japan

SAGAMIHARA, Japan - About 340 negatives of photos taken by a U.S. amateur photographer after World War?II have returned to Japan after 60 years.

SAGAMIHARA, Japan — About 340 negatives of photos taken by a U.S. amateur photographer after World War?II have returned to Japan after 60 years.

The photos represent a valuable record of the lives of Japanese people in those days — including a bride dressed in a kimono in a home’s garden, a woman selling flowers on a street, children playing tug of war at an athletic meet and men in fundoshi loincloths carrying a shrine.

Some of the negatives have been stored at the Sagamihara branch of the National Museum of Modern Art’s National Film Center along with works by renowned photographers such as

Yonosuke Natori.

The amateur photographer, Elizabeth O’Hara, went to Japan in 1948 with husband Walter, who served as the manager of the Kobe branch of a U.S. commercial shipping company and lived in Nishinomiya, Hyogo Prefecture, for six years.

Using her favorite Swedish-made camera, Elizabeth took pictures of scenes and people she met in the city or during her travels in Japan, and sent the images to her relatives in the United States.

The photographer reportedly said she was surprised because Japanese people casually responded to her requests to take their pictures. She thought they would avoid her because she was American.

She took almost 3,000 photos.

After Elizabeth died in 1996, the photos landed in the possession of contemporary artist Morgan O’Hara, her daughter. Morgan offered the negatives to the Japan Professional Photographers Society via an acquaintance so the pictures could be viewed by Japanese people rather than remain in her possession.

Among the donated negatives, 214 are considered to have especially high value and are kept by the film center’s Sagamihara branch. The rest are in the society’s archives.

When Morgan visited the branch this month, she said she was delighted to know that her mother’s pictures would be preserved for generations.

Never miss a story

Choose the plan that's right for you.
Digital access or digital and print delivery.